'06 330i, ~72K. Mine went out slowly. It started with a heater that wouldn't seem to get hot until the car had been running for 15 minutes or so. Then the yellow overheat warning light started coming on just before the heater kicked in (once the heater became warm, the light went out). Then one day the heater took a really long time to get warm. The yellow light came on and then the red one. As I started to pull over, the heater got warm and the light went out. I took it in to my indy guy at that point and he diagnosed a bad water pump (or at least one that wasn't communicating with the computer system). ~$1100 for pump, t-stat, labor, etc. Painful.

Thanks for sharing Mike. Man these WP are unpredictable. I also have a 330i but seen your case at only 72k miles, makes me worry. Do you do a lot of stop and go traffic, sitting in traffic for long periods of time? I am trying to figure out what exactly triggers WP to go bad early.

Finally went out after about 103k miles. Same behavior as everyone else has had. Heard the fan go crazy, so I turned down my music, and sure enough, a few seconds later got the yellow warning, followed by red, and had to let it cool off multiple times to get it to a place to park it and get it towed.

Most likely replacing with the OEM kit from Turner. Anyone have any experience with the Stewart EMP electric pump? I know a few people have used the non-electric, but I haven't seen anything about the electric yet.

I think it's more than a little ridiculous that these big computer screens don't let us see more information/gauges. Might end up getting a BT scanner.

Had my car in the shop. The water pump and thermostat was tested/bled and everything was okay. Looks like I just had air pockets from the low coolant.
I'm going to keep my eye on it, but if I have a strong water pump, no reason to change it.

Hi Guys I am new to this forum, but have found a wealth of info here.
Just fitted new pump & thermo to dragons car. Its not a hard job, but it is a bit fiddily.
Sway bar.
Found it much easier to undo clevis to strut mount and push it right out out of the way.
Bleeding system.
No shortcuts follow instructions carefully. (i missed the the press start button bit)

my 2006 325xi's pump died this weekend, 60 miles from home too. 89,000 miles on the car and dealer said $1300 for the bump and thermostat . It went out all of a sudden while on the highway, yellow light and 1 minute later red light. Just cruising nice an easy down the highway too.

So I need some advice.. My e90 325i has 86k on it, and yestarday the red overheating light came on. I got home and popped the hood. It was making a unusual noise. I of course turned the car off and let it cool down, then I checked the coolant level and it appeared to be full. I didnt drive the car untill the next day , I drove about 10 miles and came home , no lights came on. Then today on my way to work the yellow overheating warning light came on when I was almost there. After work I checked the coolant level n it was at the min line, I added some more and drove home. Almost home and yellow light came on again and then within 2 mins turned red. I got home and noticed a noise again. When I shut the car off the noise went away. Does anyone have some input on what my problem could be?? Of course my warranty just ended 3 months ago and Ive never used it I'd really appreciate any advice!

So I need some advice.. My e90 325i has 86k on it, and yestarday the red overheating light came on. I got home and popped the hood. It was making a unusual noise. I of course turned the car off and let it cool down, then I checked the coolant level and it appeared to be full. I didnt drive the car untill the next day , I drove about 10 miles and came home , no lights came on. Then today on my way to work the yellow overheating warning light came on when I was almost there. After work I checked the coolant level n it was at the min line, I added some more and drove home. Almost home and yellow light came on again and then within 2 mins turned red. I got home and noticed a noise again. When I shut the car off the noise went away. Does anyone have some input on what my problem could be?? Of course my warranty just ended 3 months ago and Ive never used it I'd really appreciate any advice!

It's your water pump failing. Sometimes they fail intermittantly. Mine failed, but then started working again a few minutes later, (long enough to get me home). The noise you are hearing is the coolant bubbling inside the system.

you need to get it replaced asap, and driving the car is not recommended. If you overheat for too long, you'll damage the engine, and you don't want that repair bill. Tow the car to a shop if you think it's going to overheat again.

Figure doing both the water pump and thermostat at the same time, since they are right next to eachother, and you don't want to pay 2X for labor if you need to replace the thermostat later on.

Cost is around $1,000 or so for both. All the prices I got were between $1,000 and $1,400, so shop around for the best deal.

Hi Guys
Once it starts overheating, carefully check temperature difference between top and bottom of radiator. Top hot, lower cold, equals no water flow.
I dismantled our old pump and it looks like the seal behind the impeller failed,
sending water straight into the electronics,this is not a good thing.
I don't understand why BMW has warning lights and alarms for everything, except for a failed water pump.

Let me join the club, got the yellow light then red then limp mode. I was on the highway and 8 miles from the dealership. I got it there after letting it cool down. I hope I didn't damage the engine. Are there any signs? Will the dealer see it if I did?

Its there now, waiting for a call. BMW of Morristown in NJ anybody have any experience with them.

Happen to the wife to night, yellow - red - limp. 07 335 113k. She was about a mile from home though so that was good. Going to DIY it just need to order the parts. Just did the serp belt about 2 weeks ago.

Are the newer designs better? I'm at 107k and with winter coming, I'm considering changing it (DIY) as a preventative measure. I'd much rather do it now then if it were to fail in the middle of winter. I was hoping it'd be my first and last time lol.

My turn to replace the water pump. Just over 62,000 miles on my 2007 E92 335i.

Over the last few weeks, I saw what I thought was just a light for needing coolant change at 60,000 miles. In hindsight, apparently it was the "coolant level too low" indicator. My drive to work is just four miles, and driving it to work, home for lunch, to work again, and home afterward just didn't get to overheating.

Well, on the way home from the Trans Siberian Orchestra concert last night, just a few miles from the arena, jumped onto the freeway, and up popped a yellow light I had never seen before. It quickly went to red, and low power limp mode. (That was really limp! I couldn't even get to 50 miles an our to stay on the freeway and take the next exit.) So there I was, stopped on the wide shoulder with the exit in site.

Luckily, within a couple minutes, a local EMT/fireman stopped on his way home from work and gave me a lift for a mile ride to the exit. Picked up a couple jugs of ShellZone Anti-Freeze coolant (pre-diluted) and went back to the car. It was nice that he would offer such a kindness.

It took maybe a quart and a half of coolant to be over max and overflowing. I didn't think that indicated it was very low at all, considering the drama of the red engine overheating light/no power. I dreaded being stranded on the freeway, even just ten miles from home.

So, after filling 'er up, we were on our way again, my wife also happy that we weren't to be needing a tow. She told me a story about a drive she and and a friend had to Arizona long ago where they had to stop on the shoulder of the freeway, and a cop stopped to tell them about another cop who had been standing between his car and a disabled vehicle, when a rear end collision crashed the one car into the other chopping the cop in half.

Well, our relief was short-lived, as I had feared it could be.

Just before my freeway exit, at 2-1/2 miles from home, the same symptoms appeared. Yellow and then red overheating light, and no power. I wanted to limp it off the freeway since the exit was right there, even closer than the last stop, but I pulled off to the shoulder. Traffic was realatively heavy from other concert goers returning home.

I noticed some steam coming out of the vicinity of the expansion tank. Maybe it was the spillage from the previous overfill. Well, after just cooling for a couple minutes, I was able to top it off with coolant, less than in the previous stop.

From here, we made the 2.5 miles drive to get home without any further incident.

I was concerned about needing to bleed off the air in the system, and about whether I needed to quickly replace the ShellZone stuff with BMW approved coolant. Still don't know the answer to that.

Today, topping it off, it didn't take all that much more coolant. There was still a quart left in the first gallon jug. After venting the coolant to bleed off the air (as described in http://www.e90post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=248187) I hoped I could be done with this.

Then I hooked up the Bavarian Technic Enthusiast cable to my laptop computer to check fault codes, and to monitor for coolant temperature. From what I could figure out, it looked like it was working OK. Then I noticed some recent fault code events that had accumulated.

Three of the "2E82 Elctrical cooling pump: switch off" events within the last 60 miles
Two of the "2E81 Elctrical cooling pump:, speed deviation" within the last ten miles.
And it was indicating the fault was present now!

While running the engine in the garage, monitoring temperature and pump activity, I was also concerned about the loud noise in the engine compartment. It sounded like a helicopter, or an overworked radiator fan. And that is what I am sure it was after considering what it could possibly be, and then seeing it described similarly in this thread.

I took it for a drive around the block to see if it would overheat. As the oil temp approached normal (around 240F) the coolant seemed to follow right along. That's normal, isn't it? Then, at over 100C for the coolant I started to get concerned, especially when the heater was putting out only cold air. This indicated failed water pump to me.

Now, I see this thread. Over $1000 to replace the water pump? That's just peachy.

Called BMW service. They can't work on it until middle to late next week. And their loaner cars are all out. Well, maybe they have the parts in-stock and I can buy them tomorrow to install myself. This wasn't what I wanted to do this weekend, but could be better than waiting until Thanksgiving, paying to tow to the shop, paying for a rental car so I can work this week...

If I didn't need this car as my daily driver, I would have either bought the parts online in the ballpark of $400, or waited for an appointment for the dealer to do the work. It took enough time and effort that it could have been worthwhile to just pay for the service. What prompted me to DIY was the dealer service was booked up to Thanksgiving, and all their loaner cars were out already. So, waiting, renting, towing, and 4 hours labor rate made it an easy decision.

The removal of the old parts and install of the new parts went almost identically (though it took me much longer than a pro) to the videos I used as guide:

Part 1 - parts removal

Part 2 - install

I don't know if there are many differences for automatic transmission with intercooler. But it was spot on for 2007 BMW 335i coupe, sport package, and with manual transmission.

One annoyance is where to jack the car while placing jack stands at the jack points.

Also, how can you get the last 3/4 gallons coolant out? There wasn't any blue drain plugs on the bottom of the radiator that I could find which i've read about in other coolant flush info. So instead, I flushed about 1.4 gallons three times. I wanted to start off with all fresh coolant. Would have flushed a fourth time as it still wasn't running clear enough, except that I hadn't bought enough distilled water, and didn't want to go back to the store for more. (I had considered using RO water, but I didn't have enough info to know whether it was equivalent enough to distilled.)

After all finished, I cleared the codes with the Bavarian Technic Enthusiast, and tested. Water temp never went above 97C, the heater worked, no new codes, and oil temp was normal at 210F (not 240F as I had written incorrectly in my prior post).

I have photographed an indicator that shows in service schedule in red, and pops up for a moments in yellow after a few minutes driving:

I haven't been able to find this in the owner's manual listing of indicator lights for the car. Maybe there is another page in the manual I just haven't found. This is the one I had mentioned in my prior post, thinking it had been the coolant low indicator. But it looks like it's just the coolant service schedule indicator.